Caution on this story. Toronto is the epicenter of political correctness. If the incident is terror related the suspect will not be named and the motive will be clouded in mystery. [Cultural Marxism is runs amok in Toronto]

*UPDATE* 5:00pm EST: 9 dead, 16 injured

A white rental van mounted the sidewalk in downtown Toronto, Canada and appeared to be intentionally targeting pedestrians. At least eight to ten pedestrians have been struck by a the van in north Toronto. There are fatalities.

Police initially say the driver struck the crowd at Yonge Street and Finch Avenue East in downtown Toronto. The driver fled the scene in the vehicle but has been captured by police.

I’ve now walked up Yonge St from north of Sheppard to Finch. I have passed multiple dead bodies covered up, shoes and debris in the road. Witnesses tell me the white van appeared completely out of control. pic.twitter.com/JEWynlTmZq

I dont know if this is relevant BUT:
Anniversary of the armenian genocide
The 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide (Armenian: Հայոց ցեղասպանության 100-րդ տարելից) was commemorated on April 24, 2015. April 24, 1915 is considered the beginning of the Armenian Genocide, and is commonly known as Red Sunday, which saw the deportation and execution of many Armenian intellectuals.
100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide – Wikipedia

I grew up 2 blocks away from this. If I remember correctly, Yonge is the longest street in north america. This particular area is heavy asian, mostly Korean and Chinese (actual asian, not uk version of asian). Not a muslim area, unless things have changed drastically in the last couple years.

Absolutely correct and it hasn’t changed.
Most of the killed and injured will be of Asian descent.
Maybe the odd Filipino or white person.
Most live in the condos in the area.
A very nice mix of people.
Very sad this happened.

I have relatives in Toronto and elsewhere in Canada, as well as some business interests, and have visited Toronto quite a few times. Without hype, I would say it is the smuggest, most arrogant, self congratulatory city on the planet. From their sports teams to progressive values their is no end to the conceit that oozes from their mainstream politics, media, educational system. For decades those outside Toronto have referred to it sarcastically as ‘the center of the universe.’

Multiculturalism is a rabid religion there, even though for many it simply translates to diversity in food and entertainment.

Imagine New York City, Washington D.C. and San Francisco rolled into one, and then some! And the Canadian media is centralized there almost exclusively. The entire country always has been shaped by ‘what’s good for Ontario’ as the defining criterion.

But even in that heartland of liberalism, there are deplorables. Especially in the suburbs and surrounding areas. Rob Ford elected as Toronto mayor was the equivalent of the Trump election in terms of the worst nightmare of liberals coming true. Unfortunately he had too many demons and flaws, which the media gleefully expounded on daily.

As well, the federal government became so corrupt under the Liberals that Conservative Stephen Harper endured for a decade. Despite media angst and fervor. His was a pretty diluted form on conservatism given the electoral dynamics, but compared to Trudeau Jr. It was light years more constructive.

Voter apathy, boredom with the status quo, and intense media promotion pushed the disastrous Trudeau into power. Ironically, fatigue with the status quo and the presence of a young charasmatic leader also propelled his father into the same position.

That’s why it’s so important to keep MAGA vibrant, energized and active beyond the next election cycle. It has to morph into a permanent political philosophy with a legion of qualified leaders and organizers. At all levels of society. It can’t be defined only by Trump long term. The Democrats eventually will find their next Kennedy or Obama. The Republicans need to be purged and reconstructed, though it will be a long process.

agree with you on much about toronto, but gotta stand up for Hogtown a bit…it’s annoying in many ways, but the people are for the great part nice, fine, and slightly dull
and you’d find lots and lots of Treeper types there if theyd ever hear about it…unfortunately, the country is (on paper) crazily p.c.–wouldnt even allow fox news to be offered

I live here and yes the libs are a smug bunch.
Us conservatives are quietly biding our time to elect Rod Fords brother , Doug to the Ontario Premiership in June.
The libs are already demonizing him in personal attacks as the 2nd coming of Trump and the start of the election season has not even started.
Trudeau needs Wynne to win, to support his Lieberal government and do its similar policies.
He will win in a Landslide against Kathleen Wynnes liberals, as the fly over pop and a good chunk of Toronto are fed up with this witch who is the embodiment of Hillary and all she stands for.
Then next Trudope is on our radar to turf in a few years, which can’t come soon enough.
I think conservative Sheer will be a shoe in for Prime Minister.

First… how did this guy get elected.? Is the London electorate that corrupt.? I mean, the overwhelming majority are not Islamic, as in Keith Ellison’s district.
And is this his first term? or has he went through a second election recently.? It’s just totally fucking mind boggeling to me…

The design of this van with the protruding engine hood probably saved some lives. The classic, flat nosed vans are more lethal because a pedestrian is likely to be ran over bynthe vehicles rather than pushed to the side or over the vehicle. Even so this mass murder was extremely deadly. I expect that some of the injured will not survive.

Most of the 7 critically wounded were transfered to Sunnybrook Hospital.
That place is the premier trama Centre for motorcycle crashes in Ontario.
Most that go there do not survive, if they do they end up vegetables.
They don’t call them donor bikes for nothing, most organs are harvested there.
There will be more that succumb to their injuries.
I will pray for them and the other survivors.
May God comfort them.

The 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide (Armenian: Հայոց ցեղասպանության 100-րդ տարելից) was commemorated on April 24, 2015. April 24, 1915 is considered the beginning of the Armenian Genocide, and is commonly known as Red Sunday, which saw the deportation and execution of many Armenian intellectuals.

Absolutely not. Have you followed what has happened to the Armenians in Syria since Obama? They have had to flee once again because of Muslim persecution. My own relatives included. After the genocide in 1915 Syria took them in and they created a refugee city for them which is today Aleppo with large Armenian communities and many churches. They have had to flee again and because of US policies could not immigrate to the US. Churches have again been trashed and burned. Many ended up in Armenia which with its heavily influenced Russian connections made it difficult for Armenian Syrians. And today it’s happening again. It could very well be an incident that coincides with the genocide history.

Just saw an expose’ on the Science Channel about how they framed an American scientist for the anthraxAttacks right after 9/11/01. They destroyed his distinguished good life and the poor old guy eventually offed himself. All that despite AlQaeda taking credit for it and US ops finding data in Afcrapistan backing up the terrorist claims.

The human excrement who did this vehicular homicide, if he has ANY connection to Islam, DID NOT NEED to be connected to “any organized terror group”. The Islamic command to perform Jihad is centered upon the individual Muslim. If a group of Muslims decide to band together and perform Jihad as a group, that is up to them.
The Toronto PD if they have any brains at all, know this, unless they’re told to turn off their brains in the name of “diversity”.
ON the other hand, if the human excrement who did this is simply “celebrating” the anniversary of the 1915 Armenian Genocide, well then I guess the Toronto PD will give the jerk a pass.

.@TorontoPolice Service Chief Mark Saunders: "The official count that we have right now is, unfortunately, we have 10 people that have succumb to their injuries and we have 15 that are in various hospitals across the city." pic.twitter.com/a2MCDyB16L

That’s the thing. All cultures are made of people so problems people cause will inherently be present. What isn’t natural is importing other cultures with their own problems and not expecting their problems to now also become your problems. Unless the point of all this is to destroy the culture of the country that is importing others and not assimilating them. Which is what I believe the point of Soros, EU globalists, and Muslim apologists actually is, the destruction of western culture and American exceptionalism in particular.

I think more authority organizations will simply follow the Swiss model: refuse to identify any suspects or victims due to “privacy.”

Remember the August 13, 2016 attack on a Swiss train in which a 27 year old “Swiss National” set six people on fire and attacked them with an ax? Probably not, because that was the ONLY information ever released about that story, aside from an update about the deaths of the attacker and one female victim. The story disappeared after about a day. Literally a day. The last reporting I can find is from August 14, 2016. There has never been a followup to who did what to whom, and for what reason.

And more recently we have the curious case of Jens R, who drove a van into a crowd in Munster 17 days ago. We got the Jens, we will never get what comes after the R… because it is more likely to be Rhouanhi or Ramadi than its to be Reisler or Ratzenberger. And no media figure will ever bother to report on this story again. In six weeks, Jens R. and his victims will be forgotten in the wake of the next terror attack. Hell, that’s probably already the case.

Yes. Journalists used to DEMAND information from government, and they used to get it. ALL of it. Government learned that beating away the flies of journalism didn’t work – so they baited them in with honey full of “we’re on the same side” mind poison, and it worked. Maggie Haterman of Politico moves up to the NYT and the leftists “tee ’em up” for her.

I really don’t understand what the point is of keeping this guy alive. Point a gun-like object at at cop, get shot. Period. The Canadian police were far too trusting, plus there was no good reason to spare the scum’s life after what he did.

This is my first comment on Conservative Treehouse.
Everyone who writes or comments here is great; I visit this site every day to see what is going on!! I really appreciate the depth of reporting by Sundance and everyone else.

With regard to today’s terrible events at Yonge and Finch in Toronto; I feel impelled to comment as I was there and I saw it. I am going to tell it like I saw it.

I am an English guy who has lived in Canada for about 18 years. I do not live in Toronto, but am currently working on a contract at 5775 Yonge Street, which is just north of Yonge and Finch.

Today I was having lunch with a colleague at a café called Symposium. It is on Yonge Street just north of North York Centre; which is on Yonge Street between Finch and Sheppard.

At about 1.30 pm, my friend Frank saw some smoke out of the window and we saw a poor chap lying in the street, in Yonge Street. We did not see the van. However, the person in the road looked dead, and a small crowd was already gathering and calling 911.

The café was on the East side of Yonge, and it looked like the car that had knocked him over had been travelling south on the wrong side of the road, as the side we were on was northbound and not southbound,

The body lay at some distance from his shoes which indicated that whatever hit the pedestrian had been travelling very fast.

The police arrived very quickly. The local police station is very close to this point.

At this point, all we knew was that someone had done a hit and run.

Frank and I paid our bill and left and drove north on Yonge and it rapidly became apparent that the “accident” (as we thought) outside Symposium was not an isolated incident.

All along the west side of Yonge (the other side) was an array of motionless bodies at intervals as far as Yonge and Finch, opposite Starbucks where I buy coffee fairly often.

I counted at least seven bodies.

The police, ambulance and fire brigade had been very quick and most of the victims were being attended to.

Tragically, most were not moving at all.

I saw a bus shelter that had been absolutely shattered.

Another body was just outside the Anglican Church on Yonge Street.

Another body was right the entrance to Shoppers Drug Mart just south of Finch.

Another set of bodies were on the corner of Yonge and Finch.

It was quite immediately clear that whoever had done this had driven right along the pavement knocking over pedestrians left and right,

Needless to say Frank and I were in shock and we did not hang around and got ourselves back to our office pronto.

I was very impressed at how quickly the police and emergency services responded.

At this point, I do not have a lot else to say. I did not see the white van as I was looking the other way. I did see the aftermath and it was shocking.

A few opinions on Toronto.

The rest of Canada generally does not have a high opinion of Toronto and its people.

Torontonians are generally seen as fairly arrogant and smug.

However, the people I work with, most of whom are immigrants, are very nice (and unsmug) people indeed.

Yonge and Finch is a mainly Korean and Iranian area, as far as I can see,

Many of the cafes and restaurants are Korean, but all the estate agents seem to be Persian (or Iranian if you prefer); at least judging by the posters!! They also seem very westernised as well; which is nice.

Toronto is generally viewed by the rest of Ontario as very liberal; however I will not be surprised if Doug Ford does not do well in Toronto at the Provincial Election in June as his brother Rob was very popular in Toronto.

Given how much the Liberals are loathed in the rest of Ontario, I think Doug Ford has a very good chance of winning the election here.

The Liberals are already calling him Trump so they must be worried.

OK, signing off. Thank you for your patience and keep up the good work!!

Is this area considered a shopping center, or a market area? Or is it a typical urban street in terms of commercial activity and foot traffic?

The reason I ask is because the pattern of these attacks has been to target areas which abnormally high foot traffic, even by the standard of a large city (Christmas markets, tourist traps, Time Square type of places). It appears from the photos this is not that type of area, but I am curious to know from someone with first hand experience.

I wonder if the fact that this is considered “the longest street in North American” is at all relevant. I know that logically it shouldn’t be, but when you’re talking about crazy terrorist types, you never know what the whole motive/purpose is…. beyond killing itself, of course. Maybe the plan had been to drive down the street for mile after mile after mile mowing down every person he encountered until he ran out of gas or wrecked. Like I said, to a sane, non-evil person this makes zero sense…

Hi Keeler,
As you may know, Yonge Street is the spine of Toronto running north from downtown and Lake Ontario. 1 Yonge Street is an office block and is home to the “Toronto Star”, chief liberal mouth piece in Canada!!

Yonge and Finch is not part of “old Toronto”, but is at the end of TTC Line 1, so a long way from downtown.

There is a shopping centre at North York Centre where the North York Centre TTC station is.
Symposium is just north of North York Centre. North York Centre was the City Hall for North York when it was a separate city, before it was amalgamated into Toronto in 1999. So, there are banks, big stores, fancy restaurants like the Keg etc.
There are lots of tall glass office buildings and fancy condo buildings.

Yonge and Finch is about a mile north. There is a fancy glass pair of office towers at 5700 Yonge Street, over the top of Finch TTC station, which is the end of the line. There is a small shopping centre underneath 5700 Finch.

Yonge continues north into York Region, north of Steeles, which is the city boundary of Toronto.

South of North York Centre is Yonge and Sheppard, where there are more glass condow towers and offices, and another TTC station.

Although Yonge Street is lined with tall condo buildings between North York and Finch, there are many low rise “old” (I am English so not really old!!) buildings in between. Many of these are cafes and restaurants with the occasional bar etc.

Everything that happened today occurred between Sheppard and Finch.

The guy started his rampage by turning right onto Yonge from Finch West and drove south along the pavement, on the west side.

Somewhere near the Symposium café, where I was, he veered across the road and killed someone on the east side of Yonge, i.e. on the wrong side of the road.

I did not see this, but I think he then drove though North York killing more people before he crashed his van pretty close to Sheppard.

So, to answer your question, it is NOT a high profile target at all.

Yonge Street here is a mix of condo towers and low rise small business premises.

People only go here because they live here, they work here (there are lots of Ontario government offices) or because they are catching a bus from Finch bus station up into York Region. There are also lots of car parks for commuters to park their cars before they travel on the TTC to downtown.

Away from Yonge Street, there are very few condos and it is all low-rise residential housing and typical Canadian suburbia.

The perp apparently lived in Richmond Hill, which is due north in York Region up Yonge Street and attended Seneca College, which is pretty close to Yonge and Finch.

Markham and Richmond Hill, which both lie to the north of Toronto across Steeles are quite wealthy and have a lot of high tech companies.

For example, IBM’s HQ in Canada is on Steeles East, only a few miles from Yonge and Finch. York University is also very close on Steeles West.

Wow, I can’t even imagine what it would be like to witness that. Hopefully it doesn’t cause you too many sleepless nights. And I just want to say THANKS for coming here to post that account. It says a lot about you AND us here at the Treehouse that you chose to come here and relate. Much appreciated.

Chances that toronto police will botch this case and/or will lie about everything including terrorists motivation?

Considering that just in the past few months they have botched the double murder of the Sherman couple (they originally deemed it a Murder suicide, based on complete idiocy), have discovered that a serial killer has been killing in their midst for at least the past few years and probably for 30-40 years ( the current death toll at 8 men and counting), and that the police and politicians are infected wit a severe case of dishonest political correctness, id estimate that there’s a 90 percent chance the van terrorism investigation will be bolloxed.

To all you discussing his Armenian heritage, let me add to the discussion as an Armenian. There is no way if he converted to Islam he would have kept his Armenian name. He is not Muslim, or that would be unprecedented. Armenians that were forced into Islam were given Turkish/Muslim names. They would not be allowed to keep their Christian/Armenian name. I’m wondering if this has to do with Syria and the West meddling in it. Do any of you know what happened to the very large Armenian community in Syria after the crisis during the Obama years and currently under Trump? My own relatives had to flee their prosperous and generations old businesses. Churches were burned and looted. Because of our own policies many Armenians from Syria could not immigrate to the US and ended up in Armenia which did not favor them. You have the Russian influence there in Armenia. Most Armenians loathe the idea of taking out Assad. He protects them and without his protection, they will be a target again much like what happened in Iraq. Most of the Armenians in Iraq had to flee once Bush got rid of their protection in Saddam Hussein. I think he is angry and mentally unstable, but I don’t think you have a clue as to why.

People, mostly those over 50, often ask themselves what’s changed. The availability of weapons, be they guns, knives, or even vehicles, has not. Yet, we witness incidents, now with regularity, of people killing others randomly in senseless acts of terrorism, to the point it seems the very fabric holding western society together is frayed to breaking. Strangely, the recipes for this chaos (e.g. open borders, multiculturalism, moral relativism, violent media…) are outwardly seeded, nourished, and defended by our political class. But, to what end?

The explanation should not be surprising. Each act of terrorism brings globalists closer to their goal. Barry Goldwater best described the real globalist agenda when he spoke years ago of the Trilateral Commission. (A group that still exists by the way) He called it; “a skillful, coordinated effort to seize control and consolidate the four centers of power: political, monetary, intellectual, and ecclesiastical… in the creation of a worldwide economic power superior to political, nation-state governments.” (Hint: The New World Order George Soros speaks of).

Think Bilderbergers. That’s right, the “comrades” who want to supplant individual nation-state sovereignty with an all-powerful global government; corporate controlled, and check-mated by militarized enforcement. The same folks who have secret, invitation-only, meetings such as the one Bill Clinton attended the same year he announced his candidacy for POTUS.

With each act of terrorism, these globalists are provided another opportunity to seize more of our freedom and increase their hold on power. Power that ultimately seeks to operate within a system where massive, multi-national conglomerates control all governments. A “new society,” functioning in a competitive non-violent structure. The wet-dream of every committed, progressive elitist.

Robert Ludlum best described this progressive utopia in his novel “The Matarese Circle,” which he based on the forbidding Trilateral Commission. In it, he writes, “…Before this permanent era of tranquility, there must be a period of violence, because governments do not relinquish control very easily. Only by creating chaos, then providing alternatives to people whose backs are against the wall, can legitimate control be established.”

The citizens of Toronto will, without doubt, lose more of their freedom because of this recent terrorist attack. And with that loss, the globalists will inch that much closer to their goal.

Latest info is that he is not Muslim that it was not an Islamic terror attack but that he is one of those crazy “incel” Involuntarily Celibates. You know the crazy loners who are introverts and hate women because they have never had a relationship with a woman and are obsessed with getting laid and bashing feminists. The type of slime behind Gamer Gate cause they are all obsessed with video games too. He celebrated Elliot Rodger who was a psychopath that killed 7 or so in Santa Barbara in 2013 driving around in his BMW 3 series shooting people after slitting the throats of his roommates and firing off his manifesto and YouTube Day of Retribution videos. Alek Minassian has been hanging around on 4Chan with other like minded “incel” chatting about how much they hate women and society.

So even without access to guns, this nut ball manages to just mow down people on a major metropolitan sidewalk with a rented van. Yes, it looks like he hoped to be killed by the police as well.

Elliot went undiagnosed but he was psychotic calling himself a magnificent gentleman and getting more and more incensed with others so easily having relationships. However, he never took any steps to start a relationship and it was all in his head. I bet he gave off waves of creepy to women. Even if he did obtain his desire his madness wouldn’t have stopped. Now this guy Alek is a copycat. It’s even been considered that Nikolas Cruz also followed Elliot’s example. I would say that suddenly makes sense as it was Valentines Day. Elliot wanted to execute his attack on Valentines but was thwarted due to an illness and his father returning from an overseas trip early.

So let’s ban all assault motor vehicles! It’s not the guns people it’s mental illness! No one is treating these people who desperately need help. The warning signs are there, but they never seem to do anything until the raving lunatic kills people. Adam Lanza, James Holmes, Nikolas Cruz, etc., etc., etc. Even that kid with the shotgun recently who was stopped. Complete psychos. James Holmes was seeing a therapist and sent his notebooks to that individual the day of his attack. Elliot was almost stopped when 6 officers showed up on his doorstep to evaluate him after his mother saw his YouTube videos and called his therapists who called the police. Elliot said in his manifesto had they searched his apartment he would have been completely busted and stopped. They didn’t know he had bought 3 handguns either.

We have a mental health problem and we need to take steps to prevent them from acquiring firearms. But even without a gun, they can rent a truck or van and kill or they can use a knife or poison or some other weapon.

So, Two months later, and the dead are forgotten….Quietly buried by their families.
Even I in Toronto, almost forgot this happened about one mile from my house.
But a reply to a comment here on this brought me back.
R.I.P.